Are fullbacks bugged this year?

I couldn't find a similar thread for this. (Except for ones that generalized buggy players in the beta.)

Let me give you an overview of my fm save first before I explain. First season with Toulouse, I came 2nd. Second season, third and in the champs league final (wtf!). Third season (this current one), after improving my squad massively, but only making one change to the first team (upfront, so the defensive chemistry was unaffected), I was 8th in November. My defence leaks in goals constantly. In fact more than ever, despite the players' stats improving all the time.

After tweaking the tactic enough, I've realised that it's only player mistakes costing me. So I brought in a top GK on a free, and since then have gone 11 unbeaten (IMO thanks to his better communication, commanding the defence). However, on this good run, the only players under an average rating of 7.00 is my fullbacks, Serge Aurier and Cheikh M'Bengue (the latter having very solid stats). Now I know they're no world beaters, but going on the teams in Ligue 1, they are more than good enough to handle half the wide players in the league. There's FBs at AS Saint-Etienne and Lille, who are not as good as mine, getting better ratings. And in the course of 2 and a half seasons, I've tried different settings, whilst still giving them time to adapt - with no success.

It's starting to become frustrating that no matter how well I do, what teamtalks I give, what OI's I set, the fullbacks (or a mistake from my CB's due to not concentrating) will gift a goal. In my 11 unbeaten games, I've only kept 1 clean sheet.. and I'm pretty sure that was a 0-0.

TL;DR: I'm sure I've waffled a bit, but basically they must be bugged? Players acted like retards in the beta, but overall they seem ok now, except the fullbacks. It seems that unless I have world class ones such as Alaba on each side, then I'm doomed to concede from wingplay.

Here's a screen of my current fullback settings. I'd appreciate it if you could either share your similar experiences (confirming that maybe the fullbacks need fixing), or a proven setting that has the FB's performing well.

P.S. I don't believe the wingers being so high up to be a problem, as their mentality is set much lower than it would appear, and the FB's mostly get beaten 1v1 anyway.

On second thoughts maybe this should be in the tactics section. I'll leave that to the mods to decide. Cheers!

EDIT: I might try lowering their mentality massively and having their 'runs from deep' set to never. I'll update how that goes.

You have 4 players on a defend role, 4 on support and 2 attack, but look where they are placed. There is no connect: , you have relatively aggressive placed wingers, but they are not covered because your midfield is pushing up. Your fullbacks are not close enough to the wingers. If you have tweaked their mentality, why not just pull them back to ML MR?

Full backs aren't particularly bugged though.

I'll move this to the tactics section, but i think you have made far too many manual tweaks to boot. What exactly are you trying to acheive in terms of attack and defence?

You have 4 players on a defend role, 4 on support and 2 attack, but look where they are placed. There is no connect: , you have relatively aggressive placed wingers, but they are not covered because your midfield is pushing up. Your fullbacks are not close enough to the wingers. If you have tweaked their mentality, why not just pull them back to ML MR?

Because it's harder to find great wingers that are natural in MR/ML, which would mean more time for them to adjust and retrain (and lower ratings). Maybe I'll try this at the start of pre-season. However..

I'll move this to the tactics section, but i think you have made far too many manual tweaks to boot. What exactly are you trying to acheive in terms of attack and defence?

It started as Raikan's FM12 M&M. I hadn't downloaded his FM13 version yet as he has been having problems with the ME this year. But as I was leaking alot of goals, my main goals for tweaking was: 1) Make the FB's much more defensive so that they're not constantly caught out of position. They don't really offer much going forward anyhow. 2) Adjust the wingers so that they track back with the opposition's fullbacks, but not so much that they don't maintain their importance in attack.

The two CM's rarely stray, so really I attack with a bank of 4. So I'm not sure if I'll lose alot of that if I were to bring back the wingers to MR/ML? As I said though alot of the time the FB's are just being beaten 1v1, because they're out of position. Even though their positioning and mental stats are more than acceptable, considering the opposition I face.

I had similar problems in terms of full back. They defend badly and used to unable to connect with the midfield well - they only hope that wingers drop deep so that they can pass the ball to them.

The first thing you might want to do is to make the wingers to roam from position. That way they will drop back to MR/L position when the ball is played from the back.

You may also want to play them as wingbacks. So yeah instead of pulling wingers back to MR/L, just push the fullbacks forward.
In terms of defending mine is pretty similar with yours. So far I have managed to had 7 clean sheets out of 10 games (conceded 2 games @1 vs City and 1 against Liverpool).

But what is more interesting is how they attack. I have Azpilicueta (spelling?), defenders always fail to pick his late surging run forward into the box and he always manage to get himself in a good scoring conditions. He scores 3 and assist 5 in the last 10.

Another thing is to cross to far post. It seems to work well in this ME. Also if you want something more defensive, set crossing from deep so that they don't go too far forward to the byline to cross and had to cover a lot of grounds to track back.

Because it's harder to find great wingers that are natural in MR/ML, which would mean more time for them to adjust and retrain (and lower ratings). Maybe I'll try this at the start of pre-season. However..

It started as Raikan's FM12 M&M. I hadn't downloaded his FM13 version yet as he has been having problems with the ME this year. But as I was leaking alot of goals, my main goals for tweaking was: 1) Make the FB's much more defensive so that they're not constantly caught out of position. They don't really offer much going forward anyhow. 2) Adjust the wingers so that they track back with the opposition's fullbacks, but not so much that they don't maintain their importance in attack.

The two CM's rarely stray, so really I attack with a bank of 4. So I'm not sure if I'll lose alot of that if I were to bring back the wingers to MR/ML? As I said though alot of the time the FB's are just being beaten 1v1, because they're out of position. Even though their positioning and mental stats are more than acceptable, considering the opposition I face.

Static formations don't work in FM13, much like they don't work in real life, teams will just play all around you. Defences work as a unit, indeed you're not supposed to let your full back be one on one with the opposite man, that's the dream of a winger, to be taking on his isolated man.

What i would do is take it back to basics and start again.

I hope you don't think I'm having a go at you btw, but it just looks overly tweaked. Bear in mind that 4-2-4 shape is a very aggressive one, and prone to leaving full backs more open. Which you don't want, unless they are monster defenders

As I said though alot of the time the FB's are just being beaten 1v1, because they're out of position. Even though their positioning and mental stats are more than acceptable, considering the opposition I face.

Players with pace are beating fullbacks MUCH more on this year's version of the game. On my last save , I had a direct winger with 19 pace and and acceleration who averaged 3.4 dribbles per game. Hulk was the PL's top of average dribbles on 3.9 for Man Utd.

This season, Eden Hazard averaged 8.7 dribles per game on the first season, Raheem Sterling, 17years old, low stats, averages 7.1 per game over the entire season after making 22 appearances.

I'm playing as Liverpool on my current save. Gareth Bale tore Glen Johnson a fresh one in one match. IN the return match I had to man mark him,tighly, play Johnson as wingback and play three centrebacks... it finished 0-0, and I finished 3rd in the league, equal points with City in 1st and UTD in 2nd. Gutted, that I'd played so defensively... If I wasn't so scared of Bale I could have won the league in the first season...

Thanks for the suggestions. I decided to do as Mike recommended and push the wingers back. It's made me alot more solid and although I haven't lost too much potency up front, the wingers are not as involved as they once were (as I expected). I'll keep the FBs as they are for the moment to see if I can get some more clean sheets in the near future. After that I'll definately experiment more and try some of your suggestions Koflok, to try and involve them in attack.

As for crossing, atm I have the left winger crossing to near post, and the right winger crossing to far, as that should aim for my STL each time who is much taller.

And @ Renayldinho13, I noticed this too. Even though my fullbacks are no slouches I've recently put them on individual quickness training as it's so important now.

What i would do is take it back to basics and start again.

I hope you don't think I'm having a go at you btw, but it just looks overly tweaked. Bear in mind that 4-2-4 shape is a very aggressive one, and prone to leaving full backs more open. Which you don't want, unless they are monster defenders

Funnily enough that's what I did after your first post. Unticked alot of boxes so that my team instructions/in-game shouts will have more of an effect. With the strategy left on attacking (at home) I should still be able to bombard teams without being so open. That's the idea anyway, I'll update with my results maybe once or twice throughout the rest of the season.

I'm still unbeaten in the last 15 throughout all this tweaking, so hopefully this will save my season as I'm 14 points off the top.

Thanks for the suggestions. I decided to do as Mike recommended and push the wingers back. It's made me alot more solid and although I haven't lost too much potency up front, the wingers are not as involved as they once were (as I expected). I'll keep the FBs as they are for the moment to see if I can get some more clean sheets in the near future. After that I'll definately experiment more and try some of your suggestions, to try and involve them in attack.

As for crossing, atm I have the left winger crossing to near post, and the right winger crossing to far, as that should aim for my STL each time who is much taller.

And @ Renayldinho13, I noticed this too. Even though my fullbacks are no slouches I've recently put them on individual quickness training as it's so important now.

Its always a trade off somewhere, between defence and attack. The key to is keep finding that balance from game to game, because it will shift, depending on the opposition. For what its worth, the most defensive i've ever gone with a full back is a support role, for me, an inherent part of defending is pinning their players back. And the full back is a such a good weapon for the overload

Its always a trade off somewhere, between defence and attack. The key to is keep finding that balance from game to game, because it will shift, depending on the opposition.

I read a thread on here that talked about it being a necessity this year to adapt your tactics to the opposition and look for weaknesses, so I'm always changing it slightly each game.

Looks like I have that balance now: Huge turnaround. I've gone from 5th in the league, 14 points behind the leaders, to 3rd, now 3 points behind. 18 game unbeaten run, and just broke the club record for consecutive wins. It's all rosy now

Cheers for the advice guys. You were right Mike, I just needed to go back to square one.